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Note: This is a student project from a course affiliated
with the Ethnography of the University Initiative. EUI supports faculty development of courses
in which students conduct original research on their university, and encourages students to
think about colleges and universities in relation to their communities and within larger
national and global contexts.

Description

This course took an in-depth look at some of the residents from Latin America who live in the Urbana-Champaign community. In this intensive eight-week course, students worked to capture, interpret, and present the stories of Latin Americans living, working, and studying at the U of I. Through oral histories, students explored Latin Americans’ memories of their home countries, their current ties to home, and their lives here in Urbana-Champaign. We considered what can be learned from these stories, and thought about how we might use them to educate others in our community about Latin America today. Each student was responsible for planning, researching, and conducting one audio-recorded oral-history interview with a U of I faculty, staff or student who is of Latin American origin. Through these oral histories we focused on 1) the interviewees’ descriptions/memories of their place of origin, 2) how they come to the U of I, and 3) whether and how the U of I figures into their transnational stories. The collective goal for the course was to build a small collection of audio-recorded oral histories that future students and teachers can use to develop K-12 educational materials about Latin America through the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies.

This item appears in the following Collection(s)

Diversity on Campus/Equity and AccessThis collection examines ways in which the U.S. university and the American college experience are affected by diversity, and difference. In particular, these student projects examine experiences of diversity on campus, including important contemporary social, cultural, and political debates on equity and access to university resources.